Allstate vs. Wells Fargo

Introduction

The financial industry across the seven continents has come a long way since the early stages of door-to-door service. The world started to understand the concept of the economy at a deeper level, which gave rise to several financial services and franchises. While the initially-developed financial industry only dealt with banking, businesses slowly started to form that would eventually use the concept of asset protection. Insurance was thus born and grew in popularity. While most of these small businesses either shut down, merged or were bought out by larger fish, old businesses that survived the 20th century are now multi-million dollar companies that are spread across the globe.

Allstate and Wells Fargo are both large companies that offer quality services, both inclusive of internet banking. Both of these companies have been around for decades together and provide financial services, locally and internationally. However, the main difference between these two companies lies in the services they provide and the contexts in which they can cater to their customers. The companies also differ widely in their revenue, customer base, and employment opportunities. Let us have a closer look at how exactly these two companies differ.

The key difference between Allstate And Wells Fargo is that Allstate is a purely insurance-based company that offers nothing more than a variety of insurance policies for different products, Wells Fargo does not limit its services to just insurance provisions. Wells Fargo provides several financial services for its customers around the globe. While it deals with health insurance and disability insurance, the same cannot be said for Allstate.

Differences Between Allstate and Wells Fargo in Tabular Form

Parameters of Comparison	Allstate	Wells Fargo
Location of Headquarters	Northfield Township, Illinois	Manhattan San Francisco
Year of Establishment	Fall of 1931	March 1952
Revenue	US $44.67 billion	US $ 78.492 billion
Number of Employees	45,780	268,531
Achievements	Ranked 454 in the Fortune 500 ranking	Ranked 30 in the fortune 500 ranking
Employment offers	Offers a relatively lesser number of jobs	Offers a relatively higher number of jobs
Work-Life Balance	It has relatively lower benefits and compensation for their employees	It has relatively higher benefits and compensation for their employees

What is Allstate?

Allstate is a multi-million dollar insurance company that is based in America. Owing to its popularity in the insurance industry, the company also owns insurance franchises in Canada. The company’s headquarters are located in Northfield Township, Illinois, and now operates around 19 companies across India, Canada, the United States, and the United Kingdom.

Somewhere around the fall of 1930, An insurance broker named Carl L. Odell proposed an idea to his neighbor Wood. The gist of the idea was to provide auto insurance to the customers on demand. Appeased with the idea, Wood proposed the same to the Sears group of directors, who then owned a retail franchise. The retail franchise’s highest-selling product was their line of tires that were named Allstate tires. Upon the approval of the idea proposed, Allstate insurance company was founded in April 1931. The company would offer automobile insurance by direct mail, similar to how they would sell their usual merchandise. Within a month, William Lehnertz becomes the first customer that would buy their insurance policy for his vehicle. By the end of the year, the company had over 4000 policies with an employee count of around twenty people. The company saw a rapid increase in its customer base but also suffered a loss of over US $ 75,000.

Lessing J. Rosenwald was selected as the first-ever chairman and Odell was appointed as the vice-president and the secretary.

Some of the major shifts and changes in the company through the ages are listed below-

1934 - Allstate opens its first-ever permanent outlet at a Sears office based in Chicago. The sales method transcends from direct mail to businesses operated through the help of agents.
1941 - The State of New York passes a law to remind people that any kind of road mishaps leading to damage to their automobiles will be the driver’s responsibility since only a quarter of the people had their vehicles insured. By the next decade, Other states took notes and also passed similar laws that would need people to insure their vehicles in case of unwanted damages.
1949 - The company’s headquarters were set up completely on West Arthington Street in Chicago.
1950 - Davis W. Ellis, a general sales manager at Allstate created the famous tagline “You're in good hands with Allstate”, which at the end of the decade was put to use in the company’s first-ever advertisement on television. The advertisement featured the actor “Ed Reimers”.
1952 - the company launched an automobile called the Allstate car, which did not turn out to be a success. The product was eventually taken out from all the outlets and the company eventually restricted itself to selling automobile parts such as tires, car batteries, and insurance.
Mid-1950s - Allstate expands its insurance services to other products and started to provide fire insurance in 1954 and life insurance in 1957.
1970s - The company started to offer only insurance and became a purely insurance-based company.
1984 - A program called the Neighborhood Office Agent Program was launched to help customers everywhere have better access to insurance agents.
Mid-1990s- The company goes public and is announced to be independent. Their website was also launched which made it easier for the customers to buy insurance plans in the comfort of their own homes.
2010 - The all too famous ‘Mayhem’ campaign was launched that depicted the uncertainties that one might fall prey to and why insurance is important.
2012- Allstate Solution Private ltd. was launched in Bangalore, India.

The company owns a revenue of over US $44 billion as of 2019, providing for over 45,000 employees. They have multiple subsidiaries and offer asset protection for automobiles, homeowners, businesses, lenders, condos, etc.

What is Wells Fargo?

Wells Fargo is a multinational company(MNC) that is based in America and provides financial services around the globe. The company’s operational headquarters are located in Manhattan and the corporate headquarters are located in San Francisco. The managerial branches are spread throughout the United States and internationally.

Wells Fargo was founded in March-1852 by Henry Wells and Willian G. Fargo, after whom the company was named. Wells and Fargo’s careers began amidst a technological revolution, where they used their hands-on experience to build and expand their start-up that would help the customers to come, manage their financial needs and build their businesses. They used their expertise, time, and energy in establishing a network that covers certain developed cities such as New York, to transport and deliver valuables or money. These monetary transactions, however small at early stages, grew to fame rapidly as people started to gain trust in the company and its efficiency, leading to exponential growth in its customer base. The introduction of newer technology and major changes in the banking industry have not seemed to distract the customers or unhinge the company and its financial operations, regardless of how major they may be.

Here are some of the company’s major shifts throughout its history -

1872 - Lloyd Tevis secures a large stake in the company and becomes the president of the company. He remained the president of the company for the next 20 years.
1892 - John J. Valentine Sr. was appointed as the president and was the employee of the company for a very long period. Following his death in 1901, Dudley Evans was appointed the president in 1902, 2 months later.
1918 - Following the division of the company’s express franchise and banking operations, the U.S Government nationalized the company’s express franchise which would then come to be known as the US Railway Express Agency. The Federal Government then took control over this express franchise-turned-federal agency
Mid-1900s - the company continues to perform efficiently throughout the Great Depression.
1969 - Keeping the Wells Fargo bank as its chief subsidiary, Wells Fargo & Company was formed.
1991 - Around 130 branches from the Great American Bank in California were acquired by the company.
1995 - The company becomes one of the first financial firms in the US that offered net banking.
2007 - The company acquires Greater Bay Bancorp, which owns almost US $ 7.4 billion worth of assets.
2015 - Wells Fargo merges with First Union Rail.
2018 - The company decides to reduce costs by almost US $4 billion by cutting 25,000 plus jobs.

The company also owns a museum that depicts the history of the company, along with several artifacts that were collected during mining and other financial businesses throughout the ages. The museum is located in San Francisco. The company now boasts of almost US $1.9 trillion in terms of assets and is one of the leading banking providers in the United States. It has almost 69 million customers overall and almost 29 million customers that use mobile banking.

Main Differences Between Allstate and Wells Fargo in Points

Allstate is a purely insurance-based company that offers nothing more than insurance for several products. These products may include a residence such as a condo, homeowner, renter, mobile home, or an automobile such as a motorcycle, boat, motor club, or even businesses ranging from small to large-scale. Wells Fargo, on the other hand, offers a multitude of services in the financial side of the industry, one of which is also insurance.
Wells Fargo was brought to existence in the middle of the 20th century, 1952 to be exact whereas Allstate has been functioning for almost two decades before Wells Fargo came into operation. Allstate was founded in 1931.
The company of Allstate has a single headquarters located in Northfield Township, Illinois while Wells Fargo had two company headquarters. One of the company headquarters is the corporate headquarters, where all the major decisions regarding the operations of the company take place. It is located in San Francisco. The other company headquarters is the operational headquarter where all the day-to-day operations take place. All the decisions taken at the corporate headquarters are reflected at the operational headquarters. It is located in Manhattan.
Wells Fargo offers personal health insurance as well as disability insurance whereas Allstate fails to offer personal health insurance and disability insurance. Its insurance policies are mostly limited to various asset-protection insurances.
Due to Wells Fargo’s higher variety and range of financial services, the company has a higher customer base when compared to Allstate.
Owing to its large customer base, Wells Fargo has an enormous revenue when compared to Allstate by a large margin of billions. Wells Fargo gained revenue of US $ 78.492 billion while Allstate gained revenue of US $44.67 billion.
Wells Fargo offers a higher number of job and career opportunities, thanks to its widespread network distribution. Allstate on the other hand has lesser employment opportunities. Allstate has 5,965 openings for its company whereas Wells Fargo has 10,293 openings for its company, almost twice of what Allstate offers.
Employees have reported having a better work-life balance while being employed at Wells Fargo as opposed to those employees working at Allstate. Allstate has also been reported to have longer work hours than Wells Fargo, adding to the stress that employees go through and eventually reducing the quality of the work-life balance.
Allstate was ranked in the 454th position in the Fortune 500 ranking whereas Wells Fargo was ranked 30th in the same category.

Conclusion

Both Allstate and Wells Fargo are trustworthy companies that have proved to offer quality financial services. Even though Allstate was established much earlier than Wells Fargo, It is clear from our findings and comparison that Wells Fargo is a better option to resort to your financial needs. The company offers a wider range of services and has a higher number of satisfactory customer reviews, owing to the company’s efficient performance. Allstate has lower fee requirements for the insurance services and policies it has to offer. But Wells Fargo can be termed superior as it also includes a solution for credit cards and offers personal health and disability insurance.

References

Introduction
Allstate vs. Wells Fargo
Differences Between Allstate and Wells Fargo in Tabular Form
What is Allstate?
What is Wells Fargo?
Main Differences Between Allstate and Wells Fargo in Points
Conclusion
References

Difference Between Allstate and Wells Fargo

Introduction